“On economic and social matters, the president is hard to take, his convictions are forged and are based on his mastery of the files. But on secularism or communitarianism, let's say that it is not finished ... ”dares an important minister. What believer is Emmanuel Macron, who will present his wishes this Thursday to the religious authorities at the Elysée? Here is a subject on which it is of a discretion of violet.
We know he was baptized at his own request at the age of 12, raised in an agnostic family, and yet spent on the benches of the Jesuit Providence high school in Amiens (Somme). But what is his relationship to faith, he who constantly postpones his long-awaited discourse on secularism?
He never quotes God
It is the representatives of cults who speak of it best. The Head of State regularly receives in a small committee the members of the Conference of those responsible for worship in France (CRCF). Listening to them, he would be an annoyed believer, in constant questioning. “With him, doubt and faith are part of the same coin. They are two sides of the same personality, "depicts Pastor François Clavairoly, President of the Protestant Federation of France, who has often heard him quote on this subject the philosopher Paul Ricœur, of whom he was the assistant. "His intellectual background nourishes his spirituality," he says.
"It's very Mitterrandian", abounds the Chief Rabbi of France Haïm Korsia, with reference to the last wishes of the former president on these words: "I believe in the forces of the mind". "Macron is a spiritualist agnostic," sums up a close adviser. As if he remained torn between the secular education of his medical parents and his adored grandmother, who attended the church of Bagnères-de-Bigorre (Hautes-Pyrénées).
We remember that he had barely retained his hands which were about to bless the coffin of Johnny Hallyday. Immediately after declaring himself a candidate in 2016, he also went to the Basilica of Saint-Denis, at the tomb of the kings of France. A bit mystical, he never quotes God, but sometimes refers to Joan of Arc.
Strong words that sometimes strike the secular camp
So much for his intimate connection to faith. Regarding the place of religion in society, Macron struck the secular camp several times. At the end of 2017, he had raised before the representatives of religions his fear of a "radicalization of secularism". Strong words. In 2018, he had displayed his wish to "repair" the "damaged" link between Church and State.
For Pastor Clavairoly, he is "the antithesis of Manuel Valls", who had a very strict approach to secularism. Macron is therefore hostile, for example, to the ban on the veil at university. "I do not ask anyone to be discreet in their religious practice," he declared to "La Vie" at the end of 2016. Clearly: everyone does what he wants, as long as he respects the laws of the Republic.
Macron, as his critics accuse him, would he be on an Anglo-Saxon liberal line or, more frankly, communitarian on the level of religions? “When you are the cantor of the French art of being, you do not advocate a society of juxtaposition of communities! Retorts a relative. "It's a complete fantasy," said Pastor Clavairoly.
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Halfway, in short, between François Hollande who claimed his atheism and Nicolas Sarkozy who, at the start of his mandate, praised "positive secularism" and "open" and went so far as to put the teacher and the teacher on the same level. priest. A very "and at the same time" posture. Reason why, perhaps, Emmanuel Macron delays his speech on secularism. Because, according to the formula of Cardinal de Retz, one leaves the ambiguity only to his detriment.